Just in time for Halloween

Written by Karen Allendoerfer
Published: October 31, 2009 at 3:05 PM [UTC]

Chatting with Terez about Schumann, I remembered a cryptic misprint in my part for the Symphony No. 3:

After looking at someone else's part, which was a more recent edition, I found out that it actually is supposed to be a sentence, in German, explaining that "Die Halfte gleich die Viertel" (the half note is the same as the quarter note). But really, how did this get past the publisher?

From Tom Holzman
Posted on November 1, 2009 at 5:02 PM

I may be dense, or I cannot see very well on the manuscript posted, but I do not see the "half like quarter" thing. Sorry. Can you please explain?

From Karen Allendoerfer
Posted on November 1, 2009 at 10:18 PM

That's the point, you don't see it. All it says is "Die."

From Terez Mertes
Posted on November 2, 2009 at 2:16 AM

Ooh, Happy Halloween, indeed! Although I would have been even more freaked out had that word been at the end of the score, with those final resounding notes of the 4th movement.

It's all so fitting with the conversation we had at your other post.

From Marianne Hansen
Posted on November 2, 2009 at 2:33 PM

I'm not sure that you really want an explanation, since it is so perfect as it is, but I figure it is a photographic reproduction of another score and the instruction was cut off somehow.

From Tom Holzman
Posted on November 2, 2009 at 2:46 PM

Karen - now I see it. I was not sure what the word was because the last letter looked unclear to me, even when the picture was blown up. However, being faced with the composer's command "Die," as opposed to a notation indicating that, is pretty heavy stuff.

From Karen Allendoerfer
Posted on November 2, 2009 at 5:06 PM

Marianne, it's an "original." The scan is what I emailed to the rest of the section to indicate bowings. I saw the full sentence on someone else's part later, and their part had been downloaded from everynote.com, something that the orchestra librarian does when we don't have enough originals to go around.

This sheet music is quite old. We inherited it from a private collection. A lot of our music is like that, I'm finding out: a haphazard but interesting collection of different editions. There's probably a substantial history in there somewhere. So maybe you're right--this part was reproduced some other way than photocopying, back before there were photocopiers?

From Terez Mertes
Posted on November 2, 2009 at 5:27 PM

>However, being faced with the composer's command "Die," as opposed to a notation indicating that, is pretty heavy stuff.

Now THAT notation would be interesting to see. Perhaps: ; p

Or: ; [

Or: ; %

From Tom Holzman
Posted on November 2, 2009 at 7:04 PM

Terez - there is a notation, but I have a hard time describing it. I have seen it a number of times. I have never seen that sort of command in words in a piece.

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Just in time for Halloween

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